The Watch
by Tony's-Loki
Summary: After an earthquake Tony drives home to find his husband buried underneath the rubble. Modern AU. One-shot. No character death this time, I promise! Rated T for mentions of blood.


**A/N: I've been writing a lot of one-shots lately... I hope you all don't mind!  
Anyway, this is just a little something I wrote for Batwynn on tumblr!  
Enjoy!**

* * *

There had been an earthquake.

Normally Tony wouldn't worry about it because let's face it, earthquakes happen in California very often and they're not that big to begin with.

This earthquake, however, was over a seven pointer and caused half of the top floor of Stark Industries to cave in.

Tony was already stressed as it was but when Loki didn't answer his phone for the seventh time his worry skyrocketed.

Loki never missed a call, and missing seven?

Well, lets just say that Tony isn't exactly relaxed at the moment.

As he drives, carefully and way under the speed limit with a team of twenty men behind him, to his and Loki's cliff side house in Malibu he worries that the cliff his home is on may have given way and fell into the ocean with his husband in it.

What he finds instead is piles of rubble, circuits, leaks, wood, slabs of cement...

But no sign of Loki.

Tony pulls out his cellphone and hits Loki's speed dial for the eighth time, knowing his husband carries the damn thing with him everywhere he goes.

He listens as he walks around, and when he hears Beethoven's 5th Symphony playing somewhere underneath the walls of what he called his home he runs toward the sound.

It's a big pile that it leads him to and the sound is muffled, too muffled.

"Loki! Baby are you there!" Tony calls as he hangs up, the song dying seconds later. "Baby please if you're there say something!"

He waits with baited breath for what feels like a million eternities when he hears it.

"An... Anthon-y?"

Tony begins to pull the cement away quickly, the running footsteps of the other men that came with him only background noise as he tosses chunks of rock to the side. "Loki! Loki baby I'm here!"

When he doesn't get a response he starts to pick the slabs up faster, the other men helping, a new pile quickly forming.

Tony, with the help of three of the others, manages to get a large piece of the roof off of more of the walls of the house.

There's a hole now, a tiny one big enough for his hand and forearm to get through, that he thinks he can see through so he turns on the flashlight on his phone and shines the light into it.

There, underneath the rubble mountain is Loki, pale and passed out, breathing slowly.

"Loki! Loki wake up! He's here guys, get this stuff off of him! Baby, you gotta wake up for me okay!" Tony, desperate to know if his husband is still alive, shoves his hand and forearm into the hole, not caring about the new cuts he just gave himself.

He pats the area his hand can reach and when cold fingers brush his he grips them and gently pulls them toward his body. He continues doing this until he can feel Loki's wrist against his fingers.

Tony can feel a pulse but it's not as strong as it should be and he has to bite down on the panic bubbling up inside of him. He pulls his arm out of the hole and begins to pull at the trash keeping him from Loki frantically.

He makes the hole big enough for his entire arm and half of his chest to get through it and for now that's all he can manage. Loki is too far down still and the pile of rocks crushing him doesn't make things any easier.

"Loki, honey you gotta open your eyes. You have to do something or I won't know if we're hurting you up here. Please baby, do something," Tony pleads as he looks into the hole, phone flashlight shining bright into the space.

To Tony's immense relief Loki moans and seconds later his eyes slowly flutter open.

"Babe, Loki I'm here," Tony calls as he lays on his side to get a better view of Loki's face.

Loki, his face toward Tony's own, squints against the light. "Anthony?"

"Loki, are you okay? Are you hurt?"

Loki's eyes close once more before opening a few seconds later, and he nods.

Dread fills Tony but, like his panic, he bites down on it, hard. "Where? Where are you hurt, Loki?" Tony asks as calmly as he can manage.

Loki doesn't answer him but it's obvious that he's trying to if the movement of his mouth is anything to go by.

"Okay, Loki, listen to me. I'm going to ask you questions and you just blink to answer them. Blink once for no and twice for yes, okay? Once for no and twice for yes," Tony says.

Loki nods. Barely.

"Can you move your body?"

One blink. No.

"Are there any broken bones?"

A few long seconds pass before Loki blinks once. No.

"Is there anything cracked?"

Another blink. No.

"Are you bleeding?"

Another couple of seconds. Two blinks. Yes.

Tony swallows down his fear and continues on. "Okay, same process babe. Is it your legs bleeding?"

One blink.

"Is it your arms?"

One blink.

"Your head?"

One blink.

"Is it your chest?"

One blink.

"Abdomen?"

Seconds pass before Loki blinks. Twice.

"You're bleeding from your abdomen?" Tony asks, his voice wavering.

Loki nods and lets out a pained breath, his eyes staying closed after that last question.

"Okay. You're okay. We're gonna get you out alright? You're gonna be just fine, Loki. I promise," Tony states.

"An-Anthony," Loki rasps as he opens his eyes once more.

Tony looks at Loki and he waits for him to continue on.

"H-hurry."

Tony nods and he watches as Loki passes out again. He's trembling and his worry continues to shoot up but he stands up and looks at the others.

"Mr. Stark?" one of the guys to his left calls after a few seconds of silence.

"He's down there. He's hurt..." Tony stops to clear his throat when his voice breaks before continuing on. "He's hurt. I don't know what's caused it but he's bleeding from his abdomen so we have to move quickly but carefully, understood?"

Everyone nods and Tony's glad he doesn't have to tell them to get back to work.

Tony goes back to laying on his side and he reaches down for Loki's hand, pulling it up until he can see it in the daylight. He holds the bloody knuckles in his hand for a few seconds, kissing the bony appendages individually before letting them rest on the floor.

And he starts to remove the rubble from there.

A few minutes pass before Tony hears a soft whimper of pain.

He's managed to remove the cement obscuring the view he has of Loki's face, thanking his lucky stars that none of the stuff has caved in.

He crouches down and takes Loki's hand in his own, squeezing it gently. "Babe, we're getting you out of here okay, but I need you to help us out a bit."

Tony isn't sure if Loki understands until there's a slight nod of the head.

"Can you turn your head?"

Loki turns his face away from the light coming from the hole and nods.

"Okay, I need you to look around down there and tell me what you can see. Tell me if there are wires, rods, glass... Anything that can hurt you if we move it."

Loki, after a few seconds lifts his head and he looks as best he can before allowing his head to fall once more.

"Nothing... Nothing exce-cept the slab c-crushing my stomach..." Loki tells Tony weakly, a pain-filled whine passing through his lips.

"Is it the slab that's making you bleed?"

"Nhhnnn... No. N-no, it's wood. W-wood from the- the bed frame is being fffforced in by the... the slab," Loki says.

Tony nods. "We've almost got you out, Loki. You need to fight okay? You need to fight for me alright?"

Loki nods again before his eyes close once more.

Tony, panic making him move faster, gets the rest of the house away from Loki's face and chest. He can clearly see the slab Loki was telling him about but he can't see the wood that's slowly killing his husband at all.

The workers continue pulling the cement off of Loki's lower half as Tony sits by his side, carding his fingers through Loki's unusually dirty hair slowly.

When Loki's eyes open again, small green slits hazy with pain, Tony smiles softly. "Hey Loki."

"I'm sorry, Anthony."

"Huh?"

"I should have... should have gotten out of the... house, but I-I wanted to get you y-your birthday present," Loki pants softly.

Tony's smile drops slightly as he remembers that today is indeed his birthday and that his husband is lying underneath their house because he wanted to get his gift for him. "Don't worry about it, Lo."

"I... I have it," Loki tells him with a small weak smile. "It's in m-my pants pocket. You remember th-that watch from Kay... Kay Jewelers?"

Tony's eyes water as he nods, unable to speak words.

"I got it f-for you... Custom made. Gold with rrred numbers... and hands, engr-engraved with our names and w-wedding date on the back in g-green. I-if you rub the... the watch face it o-opens and plays the song w-e had our first dance to at our... wed-ding. I'm n-not sure if its in... in good condition anymore."

Tony smiles softly and cups Loki's cheek. "It's okay," he whispers before leaning over and pressing his lips to Loki's gently.

Loki whines quietly in pain again and Tony looks up to see that the workers have finally managed to get the rubble off of Loki's legs, a few of them running toward the car they came in.

Now the only thing pinning Loki to the ground is the the slab of wall crushing his abdomen.

Tony can hear sirens in the distance and he wonders who the hell called an ambulance so that he can give that person a million dollar tip.

"Mr. Stark, we're ready to lift the slab."

Tony nods and looks up. "Go ahead then," he says decisively.

The man nods and goes to stand at the only spot left and, after a count of three, he and the others carefully lift the slab from all sides and walk it over Loki's legs until they can drop it somewhere where no one else can get hurt by it.

As the team lifted the slab Tony watched as Loki grunted and moaned in pain, his husband's hands trembling visibly, and he stares at the wood so clearly embedded in the right side of Loki's body, his blood staining the entire lower half of the dark green v-neck he's wearing.

"H-how does it l-look, Doctor Ssstark?" Loki asks, and when Tony looks down at his face he sees Loki smiling up at him through the haze of pain.

Tony swallows as he rips a piece of his shirt off and carefully reaches over to put pressure around the wood jutting out of Loki's stomach. "Not so bad. You'll live to tell the tale of one badass scar," he answers lightly though he feels like his world is caving in.

Loki nods and grimaces. He reaches into his pants pocket and slowly pulls out the watch that he risked his life for, and he gives it to Tony. "H-happy birthday, my love," he whispers.

Tony takes the watch and looks at it. "Thank you," he whispers back.

Loki's eyes close then and Tony leans forward, his head coming to rest on Loki's chest. He can hear the rasping, fluttery quality of his husband's breathing and he sits up, watching as paramedics run toward him with a gurney.

The medics gets Loki onto the gurney easily, putting an oxygen mask on his face as they wheel him to the ambulance, and once in the car they hook him up to monitors and IVs.

Tony sits in the car, one of Loki's hands in his own, the watch in the other. He stares at the thing and he rubs the face.

He watches as it lifts slowly and he listens as a lullaby version Glenn Millers' _Moonlight Serenade _fills the ambulance.

Only then does he allow his tears to fall, and then Loki flatlines.

* * *

Two months later Tony lays on his back in his bed in New York, sighing as his eyes open to the ceiling above him.

The nightmares haven't stopped coming and he doesn't understand why.

It's frustrating and painful having to relive that day so clearly in his dreams every night and he just wants to forget it.

All of it.

Tony looks to his left when Loki curls further into his body, their blankets pulled up to his shoulders and his dark shoulder-length hair flowing out behind him.

He smiles softly and draws his husband closer carefully by the waist, mindful of Loki's still healing abdomen.

Tony watches Loki sleep, thinking about where he'd be right now had Loki not made it that day in the hospital.

He startles slightly when Loki takes in a deep breath and opens his eyes. "Anthony? Why are you awake?"

"It's nothing, Lo. Go back to sleep," Tony says quietly.

Loki frowns and he nuzzles into Tony's neck. "It's the nightmares again, isn't it."

It's not a question but after a few seconds Tony answers. "Yeah. They keep coming."

"Anthony..."

"I can't help it Loki. I lost you four times that day. Four. I can't just pretend that didn't happen. Everyday I wake up and I wonder what my life would be like had you not made it."

"But I did make it, Anthony. All you have to do is hold me to realize that I'm here," Loki says softly as he leans up on his elbow, wincing slightly.

Loki's hair cascades down the left side of his face as he cups Tony's cheek and rubs it with his thumb. "I'm right here, and I'm not going anywhere," he whispers. "When these nightmares come, open your eyes and look at me. Hold me, squeeze me, I don't care. Do what you must to convince yourself that I'm here, and remember that the only reason that I'm still breathing today is because you found me and saved me."

Tony pushes Loki's hair behind his ear gently before pulling him down for a kiss. "I love you," he whispers once they pull away.

"I love you too," Loki answers.

They settle back down to sleep after that and, once Loki is sleeping again Tony runs his finger over the face of his watch and listens to the lullaby version of _Moonlight Serenade_ until he too falls asleep.


End file.
